Hallo 
I am writing and recording German mini stories. Not “official LingQ”-content, just my own little project. I will post new lessons here as soon as they are uploaded.
Orangen sind dumm
Bananen sind super:
Die Avocado
Mein Hund (Dackel)
Parallel audio (German-Russian) on Youtube:
Die Avocado
Mein Hund (Dackel)
I must say that your lessons are top-notch and fulfill the criteria of comprehensible input. Nice project. Can I give you a suggestion if you do not mind? These lessons are written in “Ich” and “Er” person pronouns. Can you write lessons in the context of “You” and “They” as well as they involve different forms of the verb? Another suggestion is, gradually incorporate different grammar concepts there are in the German language but keep sentences/ideas simple (just like right now in these lessons you have showcased)even if introducing complex grammar concepts.
Once again thank you so much for helping German learners out there.
Thanks, I´m glad you like´em
You mean like in the mini stories by LingQ, right?
For now, my plan is putting out a lot of stories and then eventually turning them into a graded reader. It won´t be expensive and I´m not aiming for Olly Richards-tier production value but I´ll incorporate what you suggested plus some other ideas I´ve had.
Yes. I meant to say that for mini stories. In fact your pronunciation is so clear in these mini stories I may use them for shadowing purpose as well. Like repeat after you and mimic it.
That’s a good idea. Count me in as your first buyer of your graded reader. I am already liking your mini stories and have just created a separate playlist for it. Thanks.
Wow, danke
Hi Paule,
These are quite nice. As the other user said, it is good to vary the speaker (I, You, They, etc…) as well as the tense (past, present, future). Of course these are beginner lessons, so everything should be kept as simple as possible.
If you think you can create a large number of these, I think you will become quite popular. Let us at LingQ know if you need some guidance or direction, as we like to see our users sharing with others in our community.
North
Thank you! Like I said in my other response, I´ll see what I can do.
Thanks Paule,
I give a couple of things to improve so that you can work on that if you want to. Positive critics that you can use. The others have already said the good stuff.
If you can, improve technically, the background noise and don’t leave empty gaps. If you listen to them, in a couple, you can hear there are “sound” breaks in your edits. You might thing it’s not important but for a beginner, these gaps create a distraction. Audio needs to be as best as you can and with the same flow, it’s actually more difficult than videos. Imho.
Your voice is clear but not the background and the gaps. Probably you can fix that just via software. Not sure what’s responsible for your background noise.
Pay attention to the transcript. There are mistakes. The text don’t always match the audio and this is a bit annoying for a beginner because we don’t have that flexibility to quickly understand those mistakes and we rely on the text.
Considering that your texts are very short, those mistakes are not really nice to have.
Not sure if your recordings are for beginners or intermediate. This is your project and I don’t know anything about it. Just from the guts, for an intermediate the voice is too slow and the story too short, for a beginner I’m not sure, because the text are sarcastic or ironic (if I’m not wrong), so I’m not sure they would be so easy to always understand. I would consider the texts more for an intermediate level, so I would speed up accordingly. You do very well a theatrical interpretation.
BUT this 3rd point is just random thinking for you to consider. I could be totally wrong about it.
For me, personally, I eliminate courses that have those differences between audio and text if I want them both. And from those left, I eliminate the ones that haven’t a good audio and I keep the others (and I repeat these last ones). Where you repeat over and over the same lesson, it’s better to have the best quality.
I hope it helps.
Hey, thanks for the constructive criticism
I don´t know what you mean by “sound breaks” either.
Ah yeah, I fixed two minor mistakes and a missing sentence in Mein Hund.
Beginner 2^^ I wouldn´t recommend them as the first lesson but someone with very basic German using LingQ should be able to understand them. The idea is giving learners very short and simple texts that are less bland than what you usually find in textbooks. The humour is pretty obvious (peeling fruit, my dog´s castrated lol) so I´m assuming even beginners won´t have much trouble
“For me, personally” … that´s an additionto point 2, right?
Like I said in another comment, my mid-term goal is putting out a graded reader and there are some things that are very time-consuming or would cost money, which is not optimal for free content.
Still figuring that out and feedback is always very helpful.
Thanks again
As I said, point 3 I’m not even sure myself. The idea is definitely welcomed as the more the better. Surely 1 minute format is very beginner level, 3 minutes would be interesting too.
Great that you fixed already text/audio match.
Now the point 1. Let’s see if I can explain myself better. 
NOISE
If you are a photographer, with noise they mean something specific right? More the grain coming from the sensor, or shooting at night, bla bla, etc. And they use a denoise tool to improve it in post-production, etc.
With audio recording is specific too when they talk about background noise. I don’t mean sounds like cars, breathing, etc. But the sound of the noise itself, I’m not sure if they call it “white noise”.
If you look online, maybe in your own language, what they mean about background noise in audio you’ll find more precise things that what I can give you. And also solutions.
That noise is both given by the equipment you’re using or the position where you are recording. From hearing it, it could be your equipment. Maybe, if you’re using a camera with a bad pre-amp, it could be a wrong microphone, or you might need a better amplifier, or you could just fix it with software. It could be even a silly thing that you can fix with 20€ but it’s worth it.
GAPS
With “sound breaks” or gaps I mean this. You can really hear them with “Orange sind dumm”. This is the more evident.
Listen to your recording in between the sentences.
For example, in between “… Orange sein” BREAK “Ich gehe in…”
In this recording is more evident because almost in between every sentence there is this GAP. Basically it’s exactly the opposite of what I said before. You can clearly hear that there is no “white noise” background between when you stop talking and when you start talking again. There is nothing, emptiness, a space vacuum.
This is probably due to how your equipment is recording, some setting or feature but I’m not an expert on this stuff so I can’t point you in the right direction.
But the background “white noise” (reduced) needs to be the same for all your talking without those distracting empty gaps. In “Orange sind dumm” is more evident. You haven’t recorded them all in the same way, probably in this you have recorded more sentences separated from each other and then put them together via software. No idea.
But I hope you get the point, at least an idea.
Good recording.
The first recording is a bit older and uses a so-called “noise gate”. The others don´t have that. AIt´s also using a diferent mic. Are the other lessons fine?
@noise
Like I said, I barely hear any noise and I asked two friends and they said the same. I´ll get my laptop´s fan cleaned and I´ll see if I can improve my recording technique but yeah.
Ok, I think I’ve said what I could to help you improve it but of course, it’s a free project and I have no idea how much time you’d like to invest on it. You take what you can.
Now. Try to listen to this old lesson just 1 minute and then yours, always here from LingQ.
If you or your friends can’t hear a big difference I don’t know what I can do. Don’t focus on the voice, of course. 
You’re right, the noise gate, as you called it (I’m glad I learnt a new term), it’s only in the first lesson. Probably the most listened to from most users as it’s the starting point.
The others 2 have, besides the white noise, also another zzzzz, probably the fan?. In mein Hund there is not this additional noise.
Anyway, good luck with your project. I hope you’ll be successful. I go back reading a bit of German because mine is awful and I need to put a lot of work on it. 
You mean there´s a big difference when it comes to the amount of noise but not the voice quality?
“If you or your friends can’t hear a big difference I don’t know what I can do.”
I can´t hear the difference^^ I´ll ask around (anyone reading this feel free to comment). I´ll take care of the fan but I don´t think I can improve anything beyond that without going to a recording studio.
I´ll also re-record the first lesson. Thanks for the feedback
I think the quality of the voice is actually very good. If you can improve the “white noise” in the background the better. You can download the audio that I’ve linked to you and compare it with yours with your headphones on. Beginners often use headphones to improve listening. I use the Airpods Pro.
“You can download the audio that I’ve linked to you and compare it with yours with your headphones on.”
Ah yeah, I have to blast them on my good headphones though. Inaudible at normal volume, especially without headdphones. I have tinnitus though^^
I´ll look into it. Danke
I re-recorded Orangen and put an anti-hisser on it. Any difference?
Better now because there are no noise gates anymore. Yeaaah!
My feeling is that the anti-hisser helped a bit with the white noise but there is another noise in the background that you don’t have with Mein Hund.
I don’t know if it’s equipment or something else. It’s continuous but in Mein Hund I can’t hear it of if there is it’s very very low and it’s the only one that doesn’t have that secondary noise.
Yeah, I can go ask on an audio forum or sth. Okay, you can hear something but, is it so bad that you won´t use the free lessons? Or not get a graded reader for a few dollars?